New O&G Provinces in Brazil

The latest discovery is in the Brazilian northeast region, in the ultra deep Sergipe-Alagoas Basin, where Petrobras identified the presence of hydrocarbons similar to those bearing oil in deep Campos Basin waters.

Data analysis confirms the existence of large accumulations in this sector of the Sergipe-Alagoas Basin, implying that there are greater volumes than those found in the shallow water fields such as Guaricema and Dourado. The seismic profile data points to the presence of large volumes of light hydrocarbons.

This well, called 1-BRSA-851-SES (1-SES-158), known as BARRA, is located in Block SEAL-M-426, in the BM-SEAL-11 concession, northeast of the Sergipe sub-basin, at a water depth of 2,341 meters, 58 km off the coast of the state of Sergipe. Following this first drilling, the consortium formed by Petrobras (60% - Operator) and IBV-Brasil (40%) will continue its exploration by drilling other wildcat wells in this area.

There has been much expectation in Brazil and abroad that new deep and ultra-deep areas would be uncovered in the Brazilian northeast, some sources still believing that there still exists a good chance of uncovering pre-salt accumulations along the northeast coast, although all agree that these accumulations, if found will contain less volume than the major pre-salt find in the Santos Basin.

With the discovery of the shallow water oil province in the southern part of the Campos Basin, originally made by OGX in 2009 and confirmed by extensive drilling discoveries in 2010, this new discovery in the Sergipe-Alagoas Basin is the second substantial oil province discover made in offshore Brazil in 2010.

There are still possibilities for more discoveries between the northern Campos Basin and the Southern Espirito Santo Basin in deepwater and also for more pre-salt reservoirs in the deepwaters of the south Santos Basin, where final seismic analysis is expected to be concluded by the end of the year. That is only considering deepwater, as many more shallow water finds are expected all along the Brazilian coast in the coming years.

 

Claudio Paschoa